Lessons in Living™ Excerpts & Workbooks

When you talk with my clients about their experiences with coaching, you will find their stories are more than testimonials. They are messages of inspiration—lessons in hope, courage and triumph. Deeply personal opportunities to share the unique lessons they are learning about the ongoing life transformation that's possible when you commit to loving yourself unconditionally in each moment.

Every step forward is an important opportunity to stop, consider what you've learned, examine your new tools, realize your new strengths and embrace the joy that will take you to the next step. Celebrating each success is key to fostering the constructive core energy that will keep moving you forward.

Birthing the Lessons in Living

I was certain one of the best ways to foster hope and demonstrate the possibilities for empowerment and transformation in your life was to allow my clients’ results to speak for themselves by sharing their stories with you on my website. In January 2012, I began publishing the earliest versions, including my own story The Lesson of Hope.

As more and more clients shared their stories, in Spring 2012, I saw an opportunity to provide even greater value by creating a series of interactive self-study workbooks based on the lessons inherent in their stories. The ongoing impact and evolution of the lessons; continued personal and professional experience, study and growth; substantive blog posts and a robust social media presence resulted in the emergence of my own unique life coaching perspective and voice. By summer 2012, it became clear that pulling everything together in a book was one of the best ways to share my message of hope even more broadly. In June 2013, just one year after setting my intention, Hay House/Balboa Press released the first print and digital editions of my book, Choose Your Energy: Change Your Life! In 2017, we released expanded print and digital editions along with the first-ever complete audio version.

In Appreciation

Many thanks to the clients who graciously invested their time in sharing with you so candidly from their experiences. While the stories are real, the names have been changed out of respect for privacy. Respecting that boundary is an important aspect of my code of ethics.

Special thanks to Barbara Kay Escher for her friendship, marketing insights, writing expertise, persistent push to begin blogging and essential role in all aspects of birthing the original client success stories that were among the earliest seeds for the Lessons in Living included in my book. Through the ups and downs of our more than twenty-five-year relationship, I learned some of life’s greatest lessons about the complexity of friendship, the importance of healthy boundaries and the power of forgiveness.

Access FREE Lesson Excerpts and Workbooks

Below you will find links for access to excerpts from my book—including my personal journey, the Discovery Framework™ it birthed and client stories of empowerment and transcendence. Each excerpt includes links to download FREE workbooks to support you in applying the same principles to transform your own life.

These workbooks are a self-study series based on my signature Discovery Framework and real stories from my own life and the lives of my clients. They aretreasure maps for discovering unexplored possibilities buried deep within your authentic self. And guides for turning those possibilities into fulfilling realities.

At the end of each workbook, you will find exercises to help you consider and apply what you've learned. By committing yourself to the exercises in this series, you too can apply these lessons to bring about the changes that will move you forward into the life you dream of. I recommend you document your thoughts as you go along. There are significant benefits to doing so. At a minimum, writing it down

helps you "anchor" the things you've learned,

creates your own comprehensive reference for personal review and reinforcement and

facilitates sharing should you decide to work with me in a one-on-one coaching relationship.

Capture your thoughts and action steps in a personal notebook, journal or any other tool that is both secure and accessible.

Commit to the workbooks and feel the shift in your life. Remember that it's not just okay to fall in love with yourself. It's essential. When you fall in love with yourself, everything else finally falls into place. This transformation arises from a fundamental shift in your head and heart. Once love transforms your relationship with yourself, it can't help but transform your personal life and work in ways that will exhilarate you. Your more constructive personal energy will automatically transform every being and situation you encounter. You will, by your very presence, quite literally, transform the World.

All of the stories shared on this page and in my book are lessons in hope, courage and triumph. Mine is no exception. I am pleased to share with you the short version of my own personal story of transformation: the story of what happened in my own life when I finally fell in love with myself.

As you hear the pieces of the story, say to yourself again and again, "This is a story about hope. And it could be a story about me."

When I began living the commitment to loving myself unconditionally, I discovered that my sense of equanimity and fulfillment were greatest when I fueled my core energy in constructive and loving ways—physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually.

Approaching myself and my life—every being, encounter and experience—with love, respect, curiosity and compassion always reveals and advances the highest good for all, in all, through all. Moment by moment, I know where, how and when to invest my energy to move myself forward on my Journey to Wholeness.

Maintaining a belief in abundance and an attitude of gratitude anchors each moment in a sense of generous, effortless, gracious flow—a life of freedom centered in being, not doing—filled with faith, hope, prosperity, peace and joy.

From these empowering insights, the elements of my Discovery Framework emerged.

Click the title links below for instant access to excerpts from my clients' stories

This particular workbook consolidates the exploration exercises from each of the other Lessons in Living workbooks in one convenient resource. As such, it is the perfect companion guide to the principles shared in my book, Choose Your Energy: Change Your Life! (Hay House/Balboa Press 2013).

“Deborah demonstrates that curiosity, compassion and gratitude can be powerful transformative attitudes we extend to the world around us when we start by viewing ourselves with these same grace-based convictions.”

When you fall in love with yourself,everything else finally falls into place,with beauty, power, and grace.When you release the illusion of fearand embrace the truth of love,you will know in each momentwho you are and Whose you are.That, my dear friends,is more than enough. It is everything.―Deborah Jane Wells